So usually I would always prefer to play WoW on a desktop PC for obvious reasons, such as much easier upgrades etc. However being almost 25 weeks pregnant, it was becoming quite uncomfortable. Luckily, my partner was very nice indeed and treated me to a new gaming laptop. It’s specs are:
HP OMEN 15-dc0029na 15.6"
Intel i7-8750H 2.20GHz 6-core (4.10GHz Intel Turbo per single core)
8GB 2666MHz DDR4 RAM
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB DDR5
1TB HDD
256GB SSD
Windows 10 Home 64-bit
The laptop also has G-Sync with a 144Hz refresh rate.
This was just over £1,000 on sale on Amazon. As we don’t pay VAT in the Channel Islands, the total came to £883.32. Normal price is £1,259 on Amazon now.
The laptop is lightning fast on booting, and seems to be handling multiple application running simultaneously just fine. As for WoW itself, it does this really well too. The preset (recommended graphic settings) are set to 7. The only thing I turned down to a 5 was viewing distance, but I’m not overly bothered by that, and so far it is running the game at 100fps and is incredibly smooth.
It is also worth noting that parts such as RAM and storage is easily accessible and can be upgraded.
The only thing that bothers me is that temperatures for CPU and GPU can get quite high (max I’ve seen is 80C). I adjusted a few settings in the Omen Command Centre, as well as reducing the CPU wattage in BIOS from the default 45w to 25w. This hasn’t had a negative impact on performance and temperatures now reach a max. 70C for CPU and 60C for GPU when gaming. Idle temperatures hover around 35-39C for both CPU and GPU. I do think a cooling pad is a must for any laptop used for gaming, so I have ordered one and hopefully that should help to keep temperatures down a fair bit.
In conclusion, it would be stupid to say that a gaming laptop would ever be able to outshine a gaming desktop pc, both on price and performance point. But if portability is a big factor for you, then I would feel inclined to give this laptop the thumbs up.